Embroidered Textile Artist

‘Standing Out’ Pheasant

I’m a little shocked at how long it has taken me to finish this piece and then blog about its progress. The first post was back in May last year – I knew I was a little behind but thats just ridiculous! Anyway the final image is now complete. I have absolutely loved the challenge of this piece, playing with the colours has been wonderful.

Above, the first tentative steps, starting as always with the eye and its reflection.

Pheasant – in progress

I have learnt so much over the past few years, my techniques have changed and almost certainly improved. This pheasant is radically different from the first pheasant I made back in 2015. The thing I love about keeping this blog is looking back at how I have progressed and how the work has developed.

It is so easy as an artist to be self critical, thinking that you have not achieved much or that you are not improving – at times this is true BUT when I look back over the last 3 years even I am amazed by what I am prepared to try now and how many pieces I have sold.

I blogged about reading a book called The One Thing back in 2015 and this piece reminds me of where I started and allows me to see that even tiny steps can eventually turn into big life changes! Its too easy to only look at where you think you should be/what you should be achieving. Instead we need to spend time looking back and seeing what we have actually achieved!

Its an great book that I cannot recommend highly enough. In Chapter two ‘The Domino Effect’ they say –

‘Getting extraordinary results is all about creating a domino effect in your life. Toppling dominos is pretty straightforward. You line them up and tip over the first one. In the real world, though, it’s a bit more complicated. The challenge is that life doesn’t line everything up for us and say, “Heres where you should start”. Highly successful people know this. So every day they line up their priorities anew, find the lead domino, and whack away at it until it falls. Why does this approach work? Because extraordinary success is sequential, not simultaneous. What starts out as linear becomes geometric. You do the right thing and then you do the next right thing. Over time it adds up, and the geometric potential of success is unleashed. The domino effect applies to the big picture, like your work or your business, and it applies to the smallest moment in each day when you’re trying to decide what to do next. Success builds on success, and this happens, over and over, you move toward the highest success possible. When you see someone who has a lot of knowledge, they learned it over time. When you see someone who has a lot of skills, they developed them over time. When you see someone who has done a lot, they accomplished it over time.’

‘The key is over time. Success is built sequentially. Its one thing at a time’

Below, the final piece. This is the second of 4 pieces I have had accepted for the Contemporary Quilters West exhibition this year.